First named in 1893 on a small tract owned by Isabella Thornton (1837-1926), whose maiden name was Riggin. In fact her tract was located at Humphreys Avenue in East L.A., a mile and a half west of where Riggin Street now starts; its original stretch became part of East 1st Street in the 1930s. Mrs. Thornton was a wealthy widow who came to Los Angeles from St. Louis in 1882. Accompanying her were her father John and brother Eugene, both real estate agents, and her kids Pearl and Charles. (I couldn’t dig up much about her late husband Charles H. Thornton Sr., except that he was a Kentucky-born lawyer who had a daughter with his first wife and died in 1879.) Mrs. Thornton purchased and developed acreage across the Southland but resided in central Los Angeles, ultimately in Hancock Park. Her daughter Pearl, who never married, lived with her. As for Charles Thornton Jr., his life was troubled and brief: he spent years in reform school, was twice sent to insane asylums, and finally blew his brains out in front of a St. Louis hotel in November 1898. He was only twenty-four.
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